Blessings or Curses: Tullow Oil Might Be Closing Shop in Turkana Soon

When Kenya discovered oil in Turkana, the northern part of the country, there were songs and dance and more hope for the future shone with brightness.

At last, the sleepy and dusty villages of Turkana came back to life and beamed with joy. People from other parts of the country, for the first time, started flooding the region in search of land. The price of land jumped from just 60,000 shillings per acre to now between 600,000 and 2 million shillings per acre.

The peak of glory and hope manifested when finally President Uhuru Kenyatta visited the region to launch the first transfer of oil from the region to be stored in the Mombasa refinery in preparation for shipping.

This was history in making because Kenya was set to become the first country in East Africa to export her own oil with the hope that in the near future, Kenyans would be spared of high fuel prices.

The glory and the joy in Turkana seem to have been short-lived as now Tullow Oil Plc is contemplating shutting down operations in the region in the next two weeks if the persistence disruptions from the locals will not be addressed.

There had been demonstrations by the locals in Turkana who have accused the company and the government of sidelining them in jobs and security.

The locals accuse the government of providing heavy security to vehicles ferrying the oil but not for the locals living in the region. They have also accused Tullow of preferring to hire people from other regions and leaving the locals to wallow in poverty.

The disruptions have already halted the shipment of the pilot program of oil from Lokichar in Turkana to a port in Mombasa.

According to Bloomberg, Tullow says that it has enough supplies to run its Kapese Integrated Operation Base for the next 14 days after which they will have no option but to completely shut down the camp.